Uhuru stops La Mada night meetings by Mt Kenya MPs
President Uhuru Kenyatta has directed Cabinet Secretaries from Mt Kenya region to stop their night meetings at Hotel La Mada.
Deputy President William Ruto’s allies welcomed the decision but challenged the President to crack the whip on those who have been attending the meetings.
In a move aimed at quelling the unease in his ruling Jubilee Party, Uhuru directed that all government meetings “must be held within existing structures”.
The directive, according to sources within Jubilee, is as a result of the meeting between Uhuru and Ruto last week.
“It was one of their top agenda when they met last week at State House. It was a concern to them that the meeting was distracting the government. They had to make a decision; you will see more action being taken against some senior people in government,” a highly placed source in the Presidency told the Star.
Uhuru, in addition, is said to have instructed that all Cabinet Secretaries, Principal Secretaries and other senior government officials work within the confines of Executive Order No. 1 of 2019 issued in January.
There is also a technical team chaired by Interior PS Karanja Kibicho deputised by his National Treasury counterpart Kamau Thugge.
Also established under the Executive Order are Regional and County Development Implementation Committees to be chaired by Regional and County Commissioners. With the Executive Order, Uhuru established a four-tier structure with Interior CS Fred Matiang’i as the head of the National Development Implementation and Communication Cabinet Committee.
A claim that in one such meeting the issue of “eliminating” Ruto had come up has sowed a seed of discord in the Cabinet and is said to be part of the reason that for three consecutive weeks, there have been no Cabinet meetings.
When the Ruto camp alleged that Cabinet Secretaries Peter Munya (Trade), Sicily Kariuki (Health) and Joe Mucheru (ICT), among other top government officials, have been holding secret meetings to plan the DP’s assassination, the President is said to have ordered the National Intelligence Service to furnish him with the agenda of the meetings.
And before the Wednesday meeting at State House, the NIS briefed the President that indeed the meetings were not purely development but “2022 succession politics was part of the agenda”.
The CSs, who presented themselves for questioning at the Directorate of Criminal Investigations headquarters on June 24, maintain that the meetings are aimed at ensuring that development in Mt region is well-coordinated.
